October 04, 2006

Be Ashamed, America -- and Most Bloggers, Too

It's a sad commentary on the state of American democracy, on the instincts of the American citizenry, and on the standards and judgment of the American news media that the unsavory advances of a pathetic Florida congressman can have the nation in high dudgeon, while the ramming through of a patently illegal piece of legislation undermining a crucial 13th century civil liberty (habeas corpus), and the Fourth and Eighth Amendments of the constitution, and the secret planning for an illegal and catastrophic attack on Iran, both merit almost no complaint or mention.

Far be it from me to complain if Rep. Mark Foley's sexual obsession with teenage boys ends up sinking Republican hopes for hanging onto the House and Senate. But how sad that it would be if it is this, and the coverup of his crimes by the Republican leadership, that undoes the Bush administration, when its real crimes are of such grandeur and seriousness?

How are we to compare seeking to screw a 16-year old with totally screwing the Constitution? How are we to compare secret email solicitations with a secret plot to attack a nation of 62 million that poses no immediate threat to the U.S.?

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How are we to compare the media feeding frenzy over the Foley scandal with the profound silence about Bush's Iran invasion planning, and with the deliberate brownout about information regarding a growing popular movement to impeach the president for his crimes?

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What kind of nation have we become?

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Democratic Congressional leaders Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid should be ashamed of themselves for leaping so boldly to the attack over Foley's crime and the Republican leadership's cover-up, while continuing to assert that there will be no effort to impeach the president for his own crimes even if they manage, with Foley's assistance, to wrest control of the House November 8.

The American media should be ashamed of themselves for wallowing in swill, when there is a cancer in the White House that is attacking the very foundations of the nation.

The American public should be ashamed for its sheer inanity and inattention to the responsibilities of citizenship.

Is there anything in the world I or anyone else could write that would cause the vaunted "progressive netroots" to undertake one of their email-telephone campaigns about the coming attack on Iran? Anything at all? It would appear not. (I would suggest action on a much more ambitious scale, but they have been unwilling to do even that much.)

That attack may not come before the November elections. But if we are granted that mercy, it will not be the result of anything that American citizens, bloggers or the Democrats in Washington have done or said. With very rare exceptions, all of them have done precisely nothing. But the attack is certainly coming before this damnable administration leaves office.

For the moment, I don't intend to write another word about Iran. It's completely and utterly futile. So I refer you to these earlier essays, and to the additional links provided therein: